Cacio e Pepe

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In Italian, that means “cheese and pepper.”  And if you ask me, that’s a marriage made in heaven.  This is one of, if not the most, simple pasta recipes you can make.  How satisfying is it to only need five ingredients and a hot half-hour to put this decadent dish on your table (and more importantly, in your belly)?!  I’ve never met a cacio e pepe I didn’t like.  Spaghetti’s a classic and just fun to twirl around your fork, but you can use any other long-shaped pasta.  If linguine’s your thing, go for the linguine.  Then smother it in butter?!  Even if you stopped there, you’ve got a tasty treat on your plate.  (Hence why half the kids in America live on this stuff).  But the real stars of this dish are the cheese and pepper.  Toasting the pepper in the butter enhances its flavor.  And the freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano coupled with the freshly grated pecorino Romano is like dying and going to cheese heaven.  I could eat this pasta every week.  I don’t, only because then I’d start to look like a cacio e pepe, but boy would I like to.  I have one word for this dish, and that’s deliziosa (”delicious” in Italian)!

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Cacio E Pepe

Yield: 4

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 15 MinTotal time: 25 Min

Buttery, cheesy goodness. A dish hard not to love because of its simplicity to make, yet rich and complex taste.

Ingredients

• 1 12-ounce box long pasta, I like spaghetti, but you can also use linguine, bucatini, or fettuccine
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper, plus more for garnish
• 1 ¼ cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
• 1 ¾ cups freshly grated pecorino Romano, plus more for garnish

Instructions

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to boil.
2. Add the pasta and cook to al dente, usually precisely 7 minutes, but taste to make sure.  Drain, reserving ½ cup of the water.
3. When the pasta is almost done cooking, melt the butter in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat.  Add the black pepper and cook until toasted, about 1 minute.  Swirl the pan to prevent it from burning.  Remove from heat.  
4. Add the pasta and both cheeses and stir until the cheese melts.  Thin out the buttery cheese sauce by stirring in 2 tablespoons of the reserved pasta water at a time until desired creaminess.
5. Serve hot, sprinkling more pecorino Romano and black pepper as garnish.

Notes:

This dish is known for two things: 1) the cheese (cacio). It’s very important to use freshly grated cheese.  Store-bought bagged doesn’t melt the same or have the same finish.  2) It’s also known for having coarse black pepper (pepe). Make sure you grind your pepper on the coarsest setting. 

The end texture you’re looking to achieve when you’re stirring in the water is smooth and creamy.  Stir in just enough water to remove cheesy lumps without it becoming watery.

Make it gluten-free by using gluten-free pasta.  I like Jovial or Ronzonio gluten-free spaghetti.

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